Household Six
by Louise Hargadon
Summary: Short, plotless, fluffy TOS oneshot. Scott ponders over his relationship with Tin-Tin, and recalls some sage words of advice from his past. Scott/Tin-Tin - aka the ship that will never sink while I have a breath left in my body!


_**A/N:**_ _This may well end up being the shortest story I've ever written. But what the hell. It's been roughly a hundred years (fine, fine, seven months. Same thing) since I last wrote. Let's see if I still can. I have approximately a million other things I want to write, and the first one is always the trickiest. So without further ado, here I go._

 _With much love to my beautiful_ _ **Teebs**_ _, and with huge hugs to the lovely_ _ **BowEcho**_ _. Despite Real Life making me pretty crappy at being around or being capable of conversation these days, neither of them give up on me and I love them for it. If anyone deserves some plotless Scott/Tin-Tin fluff, it's definitely you two. Also with huge thanks to my gorgeous pal_ _ **Kat**_ _, who gave me the whole idea, despite not even being in the fandom and only really knowing_ _ **Thunderbirds**_ _from reading_ _ **Home from the Sea**_ _(shameless plug alert) and_ _ **Shore Leave**_ _(shameless plug for **Teobi** alert)..._

 _ **Disclaimer: Thunderbirds**_ _do not belong to me, they belonged to the_ _ **Andersons**_ _. They now probably belong to_ _ **Jamie**_ _, who I think would be cool with fanfic, he seems like a nice guy. And I bet he secretly ships_ _ **Scott**_ _and_ _ **Tin-Tin**_ _as well. So there._

 **Household Six**

 _She's a hell of a woman_ , he thought.

Scott sat at the breakfast bar, sipping quite slurpily at his too-hot coffee as he watched Tin-Tin out on the patio. She chatted away earnestly with Virgil, like a couple of old women, stopping every now and again to take another swig of her drink. It didn't matter what Tin-Tin did, she always seemed to Scott as though she was completely in control of every situation. Alan was throwing a tantrum? She'd tell him outright to stop being such a brat. Gordon was tormenting Alan into throwing a tantrum? As she was walking away from Alan's tantrum, she'd give Gordon a swift slap upside the head to stop him. Grandma needed help in the kitchen? No problem, she'd have an apron tied firmly around her tiny waist in a heartbeat, and somehow rustle up a gourmet feast without breaking a sweat. Brains needed a hand doing some maintenance to the Thunderbird craft? Tin-Tin Kyrano had studied her perfectly-formed ass off to get her engineering degree, and she was damned if it was going to go to waste! His dad needed help with using email yet again? Pfft, before Tin-Tin was through with him he'd even figured out how to send an attachment too. She seemed to take everything in her stride, and she didn't even mess her hair up. She breezed around Tracy Villa with a wiggle in her walk, a giggle in her talk, being everyone's best friend, most trusted confidant and hardest taskmaster rolled into one. To make her just that bit more unbelievable, she was also crazy about him. Maybe that just made her crazy enough to be normal.

It seemed to Scott as though there was nothing Tin-Tin couldn't do. Except perhaps keep to her half of the bed. How did someone so small take up so much room? Not just in his bed, either. How on earth had she managed to take up every single pocket of airspace in his heart so completely, and so very permanently? This had never been part of his plan.

He sipped a little more quietly at his coffee as it cooled down, and for no real reason a memory from his Air Force days lodged itself in his mind.

It was a Thursday night on base at Fort Leavenworth and that meant only one thing - poker night with the guys. It was a regular thing, it had been introduced many decades earlier, and for some reason the tradition had stuck. Thursday poker nights were almost as longstanding as the base itself. As much as Scott enjoyed cutting loose on the town at weekends, he always had a special fondness for those poker nights. When he couldn't be at home with his real family, being around a table full of guys who shared common goals and a sense of humour was always guaranteed to help stave off the homesickness for just one more week. The poker nights were never anything fancy, they didn't even play for money. It was just a couple of bottles of cheap bourbon, a few bags of chips, a box of cigars and some of his closest friends. Perfect.

One night, his best friend Jimmy 'Skinny' Mulligan had said that he wouldn't be able to go to poker night that Thursday. Scott laughed at first.

"It's Thursday night, bro, it's poker night! I don't make the rules!"

"I know, but my mom's coming to stay tomorrow night so Household Six pulled my dispatch, I gotta get stuff ready," Skinny said. Scott let out a disgruntled sigh. A Household Six, to the uninitiated, is the term for a military person's significant other, a spouse or partner. They are the ones who are in charge at home. They are the ones who make sure everything about the household, from maintenance to finances, runs perfectly smoothly. They are the ones who stay strong and keep focused when their partner is away so that everything is absolutely perfect _when_ they come home. They make the tough calls, they bring up the children, they scare off the bad dreams, they soothe every troubled water with one gentle touch, and if it weren't for the Household Six, you can bet your ass that no military procedures would ever run nearly as smoothly as they do. The most significant cog in any machine is often the most overlooked from the outside, and the Household Six is no exception.

Of course, back in those days, all Scott was interested in was flying planes really really fast, and getting laid at the weekend. His perspective of the Household Six was not the same as Skinny's. He just saw them as a School Principal equivalent; telling their other halves what they could and couldn't do, and generally setting out to ruin all their fun.

"C'mon, Skinny! It's only one night! Can't you just come for an hour?"

"Sorry, man. I'll be there next week. Like you say, it's only one night."

"What do you even have a Household Six for?" Scott asked, throwing his hands in the air dismissively. Skinny laughed and shook his head.

"Ah, Tracy. One day, you'll meet yours. And then you won't need any explanation," he said, slapping him warmly on the shoulder. Scott rolled his eyes.

"Me? Screw that! You gotta be an idiot to fall in love!" he said, defiantly. Skinny grinned.

"Nobody ever falls anywhere on purpose, Tracy, least of all in love. That's why they call it 'falling'."

Scott chuckled at the memory. How had Skinny even put up with him back then? He had been the youngest, the most headstrong and impetuous member of their group. He had been just like Alan. Maybe a little more charming. Much luckier with the ladies. Nonetheless, something of an asshole whose heart was fortunately in the right place, even if his attitude stank on more than one occasion.

Skinny had been right though. Scott certainly had not fallen on purpose. It was sort of an accident, a slow but obvious one. Tin-Tin had always been there, in some way or other. She was Kyrano's daughter, so as Kyrano had always been in the house, she'd grown up with the younger boys, and always been best friends with Gordon - a task which, in itself, required nerves of steel and the patience of a saint. Then she'd come to live with them, and easily fitted into her role as Brains' lab assistant. She took care of a lot of maintenance to the Thunderbird machines, and so they'd naturally spent more and more time together She was always, _always_ there. Eventually, he got used to her being there. He liked her being there. Everything felt better when she was there. It was only when he started showering before breakfast so that he felt more prepared to see her, that he finally realised he felt something far more than friendship for her.

Now, he didn't know what he would do without her. She didn't even have to do anything. Just knowing she was there was enough. If he was angry, she'd calm him down, if he was sad, she'd cheer him up. She let him be there for her, too. If she was upset, his were the arms she'd run to for comfort. She didn't need him to reach the top shelf in the kitchen, she didn't need him to approve every single dress, outfit or swimsuit that she bought, she didn't need to use him as a pillow at night, she didn't need him for anything. She could do it all by herself - except for reaching the top shelf, but, as she said, "That's why God invented stepladders!" She didn't need him, but she wanted him. She wanted him to be there, the fact he was there for her, no questions asked, made her just as happy as she made him. They were a team. They laughed together, argued together, teased his brothers together, played together and loved so intently together, he couldn't even imagine his life without her in it.

Scott knew that he was very fortunate in that there had never been a time in his life where he had felt lonely, or lost, or incomplete. But having Tin-Tin in his life just made everything better. She was the cherry on top of a pretty damn fine cake.

He drained his coffee cup and got up to pour another as Tin-Tin wiggled her way into the kitchen.

"Aren't you coming outside? It's another beautiful day!" she said.

"Maybe in a minute," he said with a soft smile as he filled his cup. He took another slurpy sip of coffee and held his free hand out to her. She beamed as she ran into his embrace.

"What's that for?" she asked, her voice muffled as she buried her face into his chest. He shrugged.

"Just because," he said. She giggled. "Besides, you're my Household Six, y'know? If anyone needs a hug around here, it's gonna be you - you put up with more crap than anyone!" he said, putting his coffee cup down so he could hug her with both arms.

"I'm your _what_?" she asked, pulling away to look up at him with an extremely baffled expression. He chuckled and shook his head, then pulled her close to him again.

"Everything," he murmured, kissing her softly.

 **THE END**


End file.
